codices

a digital studio for the optical, chemical, and computationalanalysis of manuscripts, texts, and early printed books

about codices

codices is a collaborative working group of faculty, students and librarians who are focused on the analysis of manuscripts, texts, and early printed books with optical, chemical, and computational techniques. We draw collaborators from many disciplines including English, Computer Science, Chemistry, Art History, History, etc. We conduct our research in working groups that coalesce around specific research questions and analytical techniques. We are in incubator for faculty research, a training ground for graduate students, and a venue for undergraduate research.

Our investigations to date have focused in the following areas:

Visible Imaging: We capture visible-light images of manuscripts and early printed books and present them online in order to bring them to a broad public audience.

Multispectral Imaging: We image selected pages from these manuscripts and early printed books at specific frequencies in the ultraviolet-visible-near-infrared spectrum. We also conduct spot-level densitometry and Raman spectroscopy on elements in these books to answer questions about their production and reception history.

Book Histories: We have extensive book histories of the objects that we are investigating, describing the physical characteristics and provenance of these works.

funding agencies

We are grateful to the following agencies for their support of our work:

National Endowment for the Humanities: Digital Humanities Start-Up Grant Program

University of Missouri Research Board

University of Missouri Interdisciplinary Intercampus Research Grant Program

We also are extremely grateful to the Conception Abbey Library for allowing us to work with the books in their collection.